Of Fever and Blood Read online

  There was someone in her apartment. She was convinced of that.

  Someone who was waiting.

  She could not see the intruder, but she could feel his presence with every fiber of her body.

  The scent. She recognized it.

  It was a smell that she had known well since childhood.

  It was the smell of blood.

  Her thoughts began to race. Her service weapon was in the bedroom. She had to get it. Now.

  She crossed the living room and passed a mirror on one of the walls. A reflection caught her eye.

  It was an animal.

  A wolf.

  Eva stopped in her tracks, trying to understand.

  This was no dream. She really was seeing a wolf in the mirror. The beast was black and scrawny, its hair mangled. Bearing sharp fangs, it was watching her. A red unearthly light shone in its eyes.

  Eva did not look behind her. She realized that this was no reflection. That beast—whatever it was—was really on the other side of the glass.

  She stood straight, keeping her eyes on the animal. She thought of the demons in ancient myths that were said to be capable of traveling in mirrors. She tried to find a logical explanation. She found none.

  The wolf, for its part, crouched, as if getting ready to spring. Eva could not hear any sound, but she could see its dingy yellow fangs when it growled. Its eyes seemed to burn with even more ferocity.

  Her hand closed on the first object it met. The vase on the coffee table. It had cost her a fortune.

  Eva hurled it at the mirror.

  The mirror shattered, exploding with a cry that was like hundreds of screams.

  Eva stepped back, trying to collect herself. Was it a hallucination? Some new and unexpected after effect from all the drugs and alcohol she had consumed? Or maybe it was something else, something way more dangerous. Until she could understand what was really happening, she would not let any fantasy near her.

  The hardwood floor was now littered with glittering debris. She thought about the shattered mirrors they found in the victims’ houses, and a sense of urgency rushed up inside her.

  Whatever it was that was going on now, it had happened to the victims too.

  And none of them had survived.

  Eva spun around to make sure she really was alone.

  She was.

  At least she seemed to be.

  But the feeling of being watched would not go away.

  She rushed to her bedroom. Her Beretta was in the nightstand drawer. She grabbed it and took off the safety. She pointed the gun in front of her, aware of how ridiculous a defense it was against an invisible enemy, yet reassured by the feel of solid steel in her hand.

  The alarm clock now displayed five thirty.

  The apartment was silent.

  “Who’s there?” she called out again.

  Only distant thunder outside answered her.

  “Come out,” she insisted. “I know you’re here.”

  The intruder, if there was one, remained invisible.

  Her hurried movements had caused her bathrobe to come open. She felt horribly vulnerable, and no way was she going to remain half-naked. She took off her robe and hurried to put on a pair of jeans and a T-shirt.

  Then she straightened, guarded, looking for a pair of socks that she dropped before managing to put them on.

  She thought she’d heard a…

  …yelp?

  Ridiculous. It was ridiculous, wasn’t it? Still, she had to understand what was going on. To understand it very quickly, before everything fell apart.

  She felt movement behind her.

  It came from the mirror in her bedroom.

  She pivoted and barely had time to see the shape of the wolf in the reflection.

  She did not want to know. With an outstretched arm, she smashed her Beretta against the mirror. It shattered with a fearsome scream.

  Eva stepped back, panting, handgun pointed in front of her.

  There was blood on the shards of glass.

  She took a quick glance at her hand and saw no cuts.

  The blood spattered on the floor was not hers. And the blood dripping from the mirror—from inside the mirror—was not hers either.

  One last piece of the mirror fell to the floor and shattered. Eva watched as blood gushed from inside the glass. It puddled on the floor.

  She fetched her phone on the nightstand and called her first contact without thinking.

  It rang and rang.

  “Erwan, pick up,” she whispered.

  “Hi. You’ve reached Erwan Leroy’s voicemail,” her colleague’s cheerful voice said, “I’m not available right now, but…”

  Eva hung up.

  She heard noise in the other room.

  It was not a yelp this time.

  It was footsteps.

  The front door opened, then closed.

  Someone had just walked in.

  Or else, someone had just left.

  She pressed herself against the wall.

  “Who’s there?” she screamed.

  Silence.

  She raised the phone and called dispatch.

  First ring.

  She ventured a look out of the bedroom.

  Still not seeing anything, she opened the door wide, the phone still pressed to her ear. Second ring.

  A figure was in the hallway.

  A black wolf with eyes like fire.

  “Police, I’m listening,” the dispatch operator said.

  Eva opened her mouth but could not utter a word.

  She was petrified by the sight of the wolf in her apartment. The beast was no longer on the other side of the mirror. It was right there, in her home, in the real world. She could not help wondering which mirror the wolf had come through. Then she stopped herself. This was ridiculous. Wolves did not travel through mirrors.

  “Hello? You’ve reached the police. I’m listening,” the voice repeated.

  Eva dropped her cell and took her Beretta in both hands. She aimed and fired, once, twice. The picture hanging on the wall shattered.

  The wolf had vanished.

  “What’s going on? Can you hear me?” the voice asked, worried now, at the other end of the call.

  Eva bent over to pick up the phone.

  She did not see it coming.

  The figure had been crouching in her blind spot. It struck her in the face. For a second, all Eva saw was a burst of light. The gun slipped from her fingers.

  She tried to turn around, to lift her arms to protect herself. The baton came down on her and hit her collarbone. Another explosion of pain coursed through her body. Her strength flagged. She felt herself fall backward and crash to the floor.

  But driven by survival instinct, she turned toward her aggressor. Or at least its outline, draped in a long coat, the hood pulled down over the face.

  The face in that hood was a mask.

  A white Venetian mask that covered the upper part of the face, just as the witnesses at Hells Bells had described it.

  “Who the fuck are you?” Eva whispered, as her vision started to swirl.

  “You still don’t know, little tiger? After all the research you did on me? I’m disappointed in you.”

  It was a woman’s voice.

  She took a step forward, clutching the telescopic steel baton in her right hand. Eva realized with anguish that it was her baton. That crazy bitch had gone through her stuff without her even noticing.

  Using her arms, the inspector tried to back away, but she slipped and hit her head.

  The masked woman leaned over her.

  A smile appeared on her glistening mouth, below the porcelain mask, as she tilted her head to the side.

  “But you will understand. Don’t worry. Very soon.”

  Eva was unable to utter a word.

  She saw the figure pick up the Beretta on the floor. Her body froze with panic.

  The wolf had reappeared. She could see it very clearly. It was pacing ever so slowly, like
an impossible yet all-too-real mirage. Its coat was blacker than black. But it was not a coat of fur. It was shadows taking on the appearance of fur. The shadows shaped and reshaped themselves every second. This thing was not a wolf. Eva did not understand what its nature was, but it was nothing living.

  The creature stared at her, drawing nearer still, and the flames in its eyes were much redder than even her own albino eyes.

  “Don’t let him…” Eva began.

  The wolf leaped on her before she could finish her sentence.

  IV

  CAPTIVE

  35

  Toulouse

  Monday, 8 a.m.

  Sitting at his desk in front of a piping-hot mug of coffee, Vauvert called Eva Svärta’s number. He still did not know how, but he had to tell her what had happened the day before.

  But the call went straight to voice mail. “Svärta, Homicide. Leave a message after the tone,” was the simple message, delivered in a low and steady voice.

  Vauvert would have to wait. He hung up and blew on his coffee, grumbling.

  Trying a second time five minutes later, he got her voice mail again.

  This time, he took a deep breath and said, “Hi, Eva, this is Alexandre Vauvert speaking. I was calling you back, as promised, for a progress report on the case. Some pretty weird things happened yesterday, and I need to talk to you. Please call me back as soon as you can, okay?”

  He set his phone down, finished his coffee and poured himself another cup from the small coffeemaker he kept in his office.

  Then he went back to his chair, propped his military boots on his desk, and started sipping his coffee.

  Half an hour later, he called Eva’s number again, with the same result. She still hadn’t turned her phone back on.

  “God dammit. What the hell is she doing?”

  He looked at the phone in his hand. An absurd anxiety began to rise in him. There was no reason to worry, was there? Nothing serious could have happened. It had to be a coincidence.

  Nevertheless, he wanted to make sure. He decided to call the Paris Central Headquarters directly. When dispatch answered, he asked to speak to Homicide Inspector Svärta.

  The operator’s tone confirmed that there was a problem. The woman told him that Inspector Svärta was not available. He gave his name and his rank and explained that it was an urgent call, and the woman on the other end finally told him that it wasn’t that simple, that “events” had occurred during the night.

  Events having to do with Inspector Svärta?

  Anxiety in his gut started to become panic. He insisted on—demanded—an explanation. The woman told him to hold on. She would put him through to Homicide. Vauvert waited, feeling his throat constrict a bit more with every ring of the phone. Finally, someone picked up. It was a man’s voice, some Inspector Deveraux, who told him right away that this was not a good time to talk, that all the departments were busy. Vauvert explained once again who he was and why he was trying to speak to Eva—all the while feeling his diplomacy slowly wither. The man on the phone sighed before telling Vauvert what had happened during the night. Eva was missing. All units had been searching for her since morning.

  The news was such a shock, Vauvert did not really understand what he was hearing. He did not quite get what the man was trying to explain. Some things just were not conceivable.

  He swallowed painfully.

  “And you have absolutely no idea where she is?”

  “Well, that’s what ‘missing’ means, isn’t it? All we know is that she was attacked in her home. All the details have been up on the police network for like three hours now. You still don’t have Internet down south?”

  “I’ll go check,” Vauvert said. “But you don’t have to be a dick! I was actually investigating…”

  “Listen, buddy,” the man interrupted. “I’m real sorry, but I’ve got other fish to fry right now, okay? The whole force is on the case. If you’ll excuse me, we’ll have a progress report when there’s actually progress to report.”

  “Wait. I absolutely have to…”

  The man hung up.

  “What a dickhead!” Vauvert exclaimed.

  In a fit of anger, he threw the phone on his desk. There was a very clear sound of something breaking, and a piece of the screen came loose.

  “Fuck me! Fuck!”

  Vauvert rose to his full six-foot-seven height and barged around the piles of folders everywhere in his office. He struck a wall with his fist once. Twice. A pile of papers went tumbling from a shelf the third time his fist met the wall.

  “Dickhead!” Vauvert bellowed at the top of his lungs. “Fucking desk-jockey dickhead!”

  He stormed out of his office and slammed the door. His colleagues raised curious eyes in his direction, but no one dared say to anything.

  He gave them a dismissive wave to let them know that everything was fine and walked down the hallway. He did not want to put on a show, but he needed to breathe some fresh air. He planted himself at the open window, trying his best to calm down.

  It was downright impossible. Eva had been assaulted in her home. She had been kidnapped. God almighty dammit, it was the same MO. It was the killer they were after who had attacked her. And what were all those fucks going to do now? They couldn’t even be trusted to save any of those girls. How could he hope that Eva would survive?

  He gripped the window ledge until his knuckles turned white.

  Did they at least have some sort of lead?

  He walked back to his office, still drawing curious stares from his colleagues, and once again, he slammed the door shut.

  His cell phone was still on the desk by his computer. Using his thumb, he pushed the loose part back in place, click. He tried to turn on the phone. The screen lit up. The phone seemed to be working. He scrolled through the numbers and pressed the one for the airport.

  “You’ve reached Toulouse-Blagnac Airport. What can I do for you?” a ticket agent said on the phone.

  “I’d like a ticket for Paris. On the next flight available.”

  36

  black

  black rivers

  black rivers of icy darkness

  she’s sinking

  In the dark and the cold. She can feel she is being pushed. She is being pulled. She is being moved around, thrown into a car. She recognizes her own Audi. But she keeps sinking.

  She has been through this before. Once. This one time only, which is buried at the very bottom of her memory. Protected by the weapons of drugs and oblivion.

  It was long ago. So very long ago.

  She wants to scream, to struggle. Never, ever, to remember. For a split second, she thinks she is going to make it, that she can emerge. She shoots out of the black river of unconsciousness like a drowning girl gasping for air. She is being carried, pushed again, and she tumbles to the bottom of a staircase. Her face lands in the dust. In the black of unconsciousness. In the rivers of darkness again.

  The darkness is flowing all around her now, and she cannot see anything. Yet, she can feel the ground against her back. She can feel stone against her head. She can feel someone grabbing her. Pulling her off the ground, harshly onto some rough surface. A table, maybe. A big wooden table?

  She is trying to regain control.

  She is fighting with all of her might.

  But she remains underwater.

  Her T-shirt is being pulled off. Fingers are unbuttoning her jeans. Her hips are being raised. Hands are yanking her jeans, pulling them down her legs and off her feet. And she still can’t move, still can’t defend herself.

  She is nothing but a powerless naked body. This offered flesh on the altar of sacrifice.

  She has the impression that she has managed to utter something. “No.” As though it were a magic word. But maybe she only dreamed it. She no longer knows what’s real and what isn’t.

  She is aware that her ankles are being bound with ropes, though. And again she struggles. She tries to fight, to kick, all the while know
ing that this is some kind of waking dream, that her limbs refuse to obey her. The knots tighten. Her legs are spread wide apart without her being able to defend herself. Without her being able to even open her eyes.

  Then her wrists are bound too.

  She refuses to give up. Panic overwhelms her. She arches her hips and tenses all of her muscles. Or maybe she thinks she does. She has the impression that she is actually lifting one hand. Her fingers brush against a cold face. A porcelain mask. A hand clutches her wrist, brings it back down. Pain spreads as first her right arm is seized and bound to the side of the table, and then her left arm is seized and stretched to opposite side.

  Helplessness.

  Over and over again.

  That’s her fate.

  Condemned to be handled so, to be shaped so.

  The ropes cinch her wrists.

  Her arms are stretched out cross-like.

  She is lying, blinded, on this board in the darkness.

  Just as she was when she was six years old.

  Darkness was all around her as she held her sister in her arms, telling her that everything would be all right, that they would never lose each other, that if they stayed together, the monster would not take them.

  She wants to scream, to struggle, to shatter those memories and reduce them to nothingness. She has disciplined herself to do that her whole life. She has denied the darkness. She has done her best to banish the memories and the nightmares that accompanied them. She erased her childhood from her memory. She thought it would keep her away from the flowing darkness. But it has finally caught up with her, as she knew it would. No one escapes the shadows forever. You just get a respite.

  Suddenly she feels that she is regaining the use of her senses.

  She manages to open her eyes.

  She pulls against the restraints, tenses every muscle in her body. There is nothing to do about it. The ropes keep her immobilized, stretched out.

  “No,” she protests. “No.”

  A figure is standing in front of her.

  The woman with the mask on her face.

  When she sees that Eva has regained consciousness, the woman comes close.

  Her smooth porcelain mask is a burst of white framed by long silky hair.